Posthuman International Relations Complexity, Ecologism and Global Politics

Posthuman International Relationscalls for a profound re-thinking of the study of international relations. International Relations remains wedded to the enlightenment project of overcoming the hazards of nature, and thus is fully human-centered in its approach. The resulting environmental security perspectives tend to reproduce a dualistic understanding of human relations to "the environment" in which humans are either threatened by or pose a threat to "nature." While we are undoubtedly in a situation of risk, this is shaped by histories of social relations, economic practices, and formations of political power. By contrast, this book draws on recent advances in thinking about systems derived from complexity theory to develop an analysis of international relations embedded within broader multi-species and environmental circumstances. In doing so, Cudworth and Hobden suppy the tools for a fundamental re-evaluation of international relations, with particular regard to environmental issues.

Erika Cudworth is Senior Lecturer in International Politics and Sociology at the University of East London. Her research interests are in political theory, broadly conceived, particularly feminisms, ecologisms and complexity theory, food consumption and production, human relations with non-human animals, and educational inclusions/exclusions. She is the author of Environment and Society (Routledge, 2003), Developing Ecofeminist Theory: the Complexity of Difference (Palgrave, 2005), The Modern State: Theories and Ideologies (with Tim Hall and John McGovern, Edinburgh University Press, 2007), and Social Lives with Other Animals: Tales of Sex, Death and Love (Palgrave, 2011).

Stephen Hobden is a Senior Lecturer in International Politics at the University of East London. His main areas of interest are International Relations Theory, China in world politics, and North-South relations. He is the author of International Relations and Historical Sociology: Breaking Down Boundaries (Routledge, 1998), and edited, together with John Hobson, Historical Sociology of International Relations (Cambridge University Press, 2002).

1. Introducing Complexity and Posthumanism to International Politics * 2. Complexity Theory in the Social Sciences * 3. Complex International Systems * 4. Emergent Features in International System * 5. Complex Ecologism * 6. The Politics of Posthumanism * 7. For a Posthuman International Relations * Bibliography